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Dame Alice Kyteler – Kilkenny’s Medievel Witch

Dame Alice Kyteler was born at Kyteler’s House, Kilkenny in 1280 to wealthy Norman parents. Forty-four years later, in 1324, she fled to England to escape being burned as a witch and in July of that year, her property, including Kytelers Inn was confiscated.

In the intervening years Dame Alice had married four times, had been Mistress of Kytelers Inn and had become a central figure in a battle between the Church and the Temporal Power in Ireland.

Her first husband was one of her father’s former associates, William Outlawe, who was also a highly successful banker from Coal Market St and like her father, of Norman stock. This man was the brother of Roger Outlawe, Chancellor of all Ireland, whose position and power could one day play a dramatic part in the saga of witchcraft and heresy for which she would be charged, found guilty and sentenced to death.